That was a neat little trick you pulled off on my recent flight. I mean pull around the coffee, tea, and juice service cart and ask politely if I want an ice cold Coca-Cola or perhaps a zumo de manzana so fresh I’d feel like I picked it myself and ran it through my Jack LaLanne juicer.

Instead I sifted through the dozen or so offerings and opted for Nescafé espresso with milk. “Espresso” I thought….what a nice treat on my quick international commuter flight. Ah to be on the Avenue des Champs-Élysées nursing my espresso at a sidewalk cafe as tourists from around the globe carrying their fancy Louis Vuitton and Givenchy shopping bags paraded in front of me to their next stops in their retail debauchery sojourns.

Yes, Iberia, you had me at “Nescafé” as I mentally locked arms with George Clooney and Penelope Cruz preparing to sip the smooth java gold that only this instant brand can deliver.

Then, Iberia, you cut me down to earth in second. As if being sliced effortlessly by a matador’s sabre in Madrid’s legendary bull ring you struck! After serving my espresso, the bad news was delivered: “Five Euros, please…” Imagine my look of astonishment as I fished out my Euro coins, scrambling to find the right combination to equal the magic number that had wrestled me from my daydream with those beautiful Oscar winners.

I mean, really, Iberia?

Charging for drinks without alcohol?

This is a new twist on squeezing revenue out of your passengers. At least announce it in Spanish over the intercom so it gives the illusion there was fair warning. What was I supposed to do after it was served? Refuse to pay? What kind of entitled American traveler would attempt that? (Probably a lot, but not me…) I paid while the empathetic flight attendant embraced me in a way only a mature, seasoned air hostess could while reaching into your wallet for five Euros.

At the end of it, I sipped on those four ounces of heaven and toasted to George and Penelope. I’d like to think no they toasted back. 

The post The Saga of the Five Euro Nescafé appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

Kathy Bates, Diane Kruger, The Clooneys and Helen Mirren all supported with Hashtag Activism.

Okay, so where am I? 

I’m writing from this from one of the quasi VIP lounges at LAX (destination?: Parts Unknown) on this fancy, new vintage writing accessory from Querkywriter (no, this is not a paid endorsement…).

You know, there is something special about the heavy, mechanical feel of an old typewriter keyboard. You can feel the keys working as you type, offering a deeper and infinitely more tactile experience than contemporary flat, plastic keyboards. The only problem is that typewriter keyboards are attached to old typewriters. They are heavy, they need ink, and you can’t work on one in Starbucks lest you reach the upper echelon of hipster douchedom. More on that later…

Katherine Heigl literally shined on stage with David Duchovny.

 On a 60 degree evening who would have guessed that sweat was back?! During the ceremony, everyone looked like their agents just told them their shows were cancelled or a big part went elsewhere. Bright and shiny was definitely in. Hundreds of stars, including Clive Owen and Katherine Heigl, sported glistening foreheads while fanning themselves as soon as the teleprompter shoo’ed them away. Management at the luxury hotel insisted that the air conditioning was on full blast. Perhaps it was too much whiskey — I mean even Kevin Spacey brought his drink on stage to accept his Globe (that’s how he rolls) — or maybe it was the air; all I know is that I’ll feel a lot less awkward sweating in the future.

“And one last thing: to reiterate what we’ve all been talking about, today was an extraordinary day,” said Clooney. “There were millions of people who marched not just in Paris, but around the world. And they were Christians and Jews and Muslims. They were leaders of countries all over the world. And they didn’t march in protest; they marched in support of the idea that we will not walk in fear. We won’t do it. So, Je Suis Charlie.”

“We are a little bit out of touch in Hollywood every once in a while, I think,” Clooney said. “It’s probably a good thing. We’re the ones who talked about AIDS when it was just being whispered, and we talked about civil rights when it wasn’t really popular. And we, you know, we bring up subjects, we are the ones—this Academy, this group of people gave Hattie McDaniel an Oscar in 1939 when blacks were still sitting in the backs of theaters. I’m proud to be a part of this Academy, proud to be part of this community, and proud to be out of touch.”

Gina Rodriguez Made Us Cry

Jane the Virgin star Gina Rodriguez was the CW network’s first Golden Globes nominee and today she’s their Golden Globe winner! Judging by where she was sitting (aka the nosebleed section which was much closer to Hollywood than Beverly Hills) this was quite an upside win. Once she made her long hike to the podium, she unleashed her words that lefts us all a little weepy:

“This award is so much more than myself,” she said. “It represents a culture that wants to see themselves as heroes.”

Not-So-Candid Globes Moments

Sweating up a storm with (l to r) Camila Alves, Jennifer Aniston, Justin Theroux, Matthew McConaughey.

Big thumbs up from Salma Hayek.

JLo and her Golden Globes

Hollywood’s Royal Couple: George and Amal Clooney

Emily Blunt and that guy from The Office.

Good Girl Rosamund Pike dressing oh so bad on the red carpet.

Qwerkywriter

I led the column with a tease about my new keyboard. The Qwerkywriter from Qwerkytoys is an authentic mechanical typewriter keyboard that can be used with your desktop, laptop, or even tablet. You can get that retro feel from a typewriter without eschewing modern conveniences like inserting and deleting. After almost $130,000 on Kickstarter, the Qwertywriter is headed for mass production, with units shipping summer 2015. For now, you can preorder a Qwerkywriter for around $300.

The post Sweaty Globes appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

I’m in the middle of Hollywood with some interns (no, not Lewinsky-types, actual interns interviewing me for a Pepperdine University thesis they are writing for their masters degrees.)

We were at a Starbucks because I was still reeling from losing $100 in the office pool. I bet all my M&Ms money that George Clooney was going to get up, put on his best black Oscars night leftover suit, start sweating profusely, text “ABORT! ABORT!” to an unlisted number, and wait for a helicopter flown by Leo DiCaprio and a dozen 25-year-old models to rescue him and fly to Bang-A-Ho Island where he can be single forever. But he didn’t do that, and now someone from accounting is happily skipping to the 7-11 to buy $100 worth of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos and day-one pizza slices. THANKS ALOT GEORGE!

I haven’t been interviewed in a long time. The last time was that Italian Business Week-esque debacle that still has the Eastern Mediterranean villagers sharpening their pitchforks and lighting their makeshift torches. Yet I digress…

So, “This fame thing?” I tell them, “Really f**ked me up for a really long time. I didn’t know how to do it; I didn’t know how to engage with it; it stressed me out. And people would say, ‘You just have to be yourself,’ and I was like, ‘But I don’t know who that is yet!’ New York. If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere. I need to get back there. Once upon a time I was famous in New York. The ad exec knew I would bring them the best commercials and juice stories.

The bottom line remains for those jumping into advertising: Don’t do it!

Advertising is the industry that people who were not lucky enough to get actual “creative” jobs end up in. These people—creative people whose artistic or literary dreams did not work out, often due to economic forces far beyond their control—find themselves in a position in which they are obliged to use their creative talents for purely commercial ends. Selling soap, so to speak. This causes quite a bit of cognitive dissonance. These people therefore expend quite a bit of time and effort justifying the position they find themselves in, in life. (As do we all!) Having justified their position to themselves, they seek to bolster their justification by attracting others like themselves into their same field. The more creative artists who do advertising for a living, the more of a real, justifiable, creative career it must be. They therefore use their considerable creative talents to sell the field of advertising itself, to their peers.

Do not fall for it, kids. Don’t go into advertising.

Advertising is a far more stable career than art, or music, or writing books, or journalism—the fields that many of the people in advertising wanted to go into, originally. Those creative and artistic fields are extremely competitive. They are harder to break into. They tend to be less lucrative. Forging a successful career in any of them through one’s own creativity alone is a dream that will come true only for a relatively low number of people. Lots of people want to be famous musicians. Only few will achieve that. For the rest, the advertising industry awaits, ready to use those same creative talents to sell things. Advertising is a field that is not going away. It will take you just as readily as the cold, uncaring whims of public attention will spit you out. It is a profession in which you can build a stable career. It is a good living. And Mad Men. Mad Men. So glamorous.

Don’t go into advertising.

Advertising offers the creative person a bargain: You can use your creativity. Just not for yourself. In fact, you must use your creative skills in the service of something diametrically opposed to the ideals that creative people generally espouse. You will sell your creativity, for a tidy sum, to the world’s faceless corporations. You, the artist, will paint their faces. You, the musician, will give these corporations their voice. You, the writer, will help these corporations speak poetically. Your creativity is pooled and used to give character to something that has no character: a corporation, a machine that makes money. Your talents are used to give that machine a soothing, attractive halo. This, at the end of your advertising career, will be the sum total of your creative output. This will be your artistic legacy. This will be what all of your poetry has accomplished. A pretty face on the machine. You, yourself, and your own soul are not part of this equation. Your own creativity does not serve those things any more.

Don’t go into advertising.

Your creativity, as trite as it sounds, is worth more than that corporation will ever pay you. We all need jobs. There is nothing wrong with doing something that is not your dream job, out of necessity. But it doesn’t have to be advertising. If you are young, you have time to try a lot of things. Try to be a writer. Try to make it with your band. Try to be a working artist. If it doesn’t work out financially, at least you gave it a shot. And you never have to stop making art, regardless of your circumstances. Unless you agree to sell your creativity to that machine.

The advertising industry wants you. They need you. Without you, and your creativity, all the corporations lose their faces. They’re not pretty any more. They need you, and your creativity, the same way that a vampire needs blood. They’ll pay you handsomely. But it will never, ever be worth it.

Don’t do it!

The post Vision Dreams of Passion appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

1. Assembling press kits (yes, we still use paper kits because the media
   reads on paper and takes copy points from the flash drive) and,
2. Packing a suitcase (I roll with a 22” Hartmann beauty and it can
   still be a struggle.)

Zyla packs with style.

Everyone needs a “Clooney” or “Farmiga” to go with their perfectly packed suitcase!

The post Travel Companions appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

Score another round to social media.

photo credit Scott Garfield ©Disney Enterprises

Pictured: photographer Douglas Kirkland (left) and Actor in a Leading Role Nominee George Clooney.  credit: Matt Petit/©A.M.P.A.

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